Cannes: Sundance Selects Takes U.S. For ‘The Selfish Giant’

British title premiered in Directors' Fortnight

Maintaining a strong acquistions pace, Sundance Selects has acquired North American rights to Clio Barnard’s “The Selfish Giant,” following its world premiere in the Directors Fortnight at Cannes.

It’s the fourth Cannes buy for Sundance Selects, which has also bought a pair of competition titles — “Young & Beautiful” and “Blue Is the Warmest Color” — along with the upcoming “Two Days, One Night.”

“Giant” stars Conner Chapman, Shaun Thomas and Sean Gilder, and was produced by Tracy O’Riordan with the backing of British Film Institute and Film4.

The film centers on a 13-year-old boy and his best friend who begin collecting scrap metal for a local scrap dealer — which drives a wedge between the boys.

Guy Lodge wrote in his review for Variety: “Oscar Wilde is uncharacteristically muffled in ‘The Selfish Giant,’ an abstruse contempo interpretation of Wilde’s Christian fairy tale, but writer-helmer Clio Barnard’s voice comes through loud and clear. A jaggedly moving study of a feral adolescent (astonishing newcomer Conner Chapman) on a rough journey to grace, the pic is ostensibly more conventional than Barnard’s acclaimed hybrid-doc debut, ‘The Arbor,’ but exhibits stunning formal progress nonetheless.”

The deal for “Giant” was negotiated by Arianna Bocco for Sundance Selects/IFC Films with Mike Goodridge of Protagonist Pictures on behalf of the filmmakers.